Ride

I got up at early o’clock so that I could go for a ride before the temperature started to rise too far. As I started off I heard a creak from the crank. This started spelling “game over”. The creaking got louder and louder. By the time I got to the meeting point the crank was loose, there was no way that I would be cycling at any speed on that. My only option was to limp home slowly. I was a little disappointed.

Sleep

I got home fully intending to go out cycling with the Wednesday morning slow group. I sat on the sofa, had a cup of tea, closed my eyes. When I opened them, it was way past the time that they set off. I knew I was tired but I didn’t realise quite how tired I’d become.

Seat

I strung the other chair up today. Once I’d done the rope work I sat in it, just to test it. Everything seemed OK until I slid out of the seat. That’s when all the cords broke down one side. I took the seat down in disgust. The day had go off to a bad start and was continuing that way.

Crank

In an effort to make amends for this morning I tried to repair my bike. In theory all I had to do was tighten the crank bolts. It didn’t matter how much I tried the crank still creaked. This is a bad sign as it means that the crank is damaged and will be prone to undoing from now on in. I don’t really want to buy a new crank set at the moment. I just tightened it up as much as I could and hoped that it would not fall apart too rapidly.

Game

I found the game Universal Paper clips on the internet this afternoon. It looked like a simple little game but it was so highly addictive that it swallowed up the rest of the day. I really shouldn’t have started but once I did it was all encompassing.

Watering

I pulled myself away from the game for a few minutes to water the garden. It had been a steamy and hot day and the flowers had started to wilt. I think that they were grateful for the drink and the perked up considerably.

Dinner

We prepared salmon and salad for dinner this evening and ate it whilst watching the television. The weather forecast told us that it would be a lot cooler tomorrow but not until the afternoon.

Cats

We spent the evening entering open water swims and playing with the cats. In fact, we mainly played with the cats.

Swim

We fully intended to get up a little earlier and start the day with a swim. This was a good idea but the reality of the situation is that I found the snooze button on the alarm. Neither of us was that enthusiastic to get going so neither of us did. I felt a little guilty about that.

Run

I went for my usual twelve-minute run/walk this morning before it got to hot. It went reasonably well in that it was about the right speed and didn’t hurt too much. I like it when it doesn’t hurt too much.

Chair

There are some hanging chairs in the garage. They have not been hanging for a very long time so I decided that today was the day that one of them hung. There was a little bit of rope in the garage as well, all the materials I needed were there. It was the work of a few minutes to lash the chair to a beam. The trial sit was a moment of trepidation, I was taken by surprise by the amount of stretch in all the cords. At least I didn’t pull the roof down.

Frame

Now that I had a sanding machine I could set to work on my bamboo bike frame. I spend a happy afternoon in the garden trying to tidy up all of the lugs ready for painting. I can see that there is a lot more work to do

Curry

I made a curry for dinner. Most of the ingredients came in a box which made the preparation very easy. All I had to do was add chicken, an onion and a couple of potatoes. I removed a couple of chillies as neither of us wanted it to be too hot. I missed one of the chillies but found it in a very hot way a little later when I bit into it. I’m sure that the curry tasted good, the problem was that I could taste nothing other than hot.

Ironing

The ironing pile had been building up and I felt strong enough to tackle it. I stood in front of the television and worked my way thorough the clothes with my flattening tool.

Supper

After all the dull ironing I needed something to buoy me up, cheese and biscuits did the trick.

Lie-in

Despite our best intentions to get up and go for a swim we both succumbed to laziness and stayed in bed for a proper lie in. I feel that I need at least one proper lie in every week. I used to try and have a lie in on Sundays but now Monday seems to have usurped Sunday.

Sausages

After running a few errands, we went back to the shiny and new DIY store. To our surprise there was a sausage sizzle in the car park. They are usually only on the weekend. We wandered over to solve the breakfast problem and to have a chat. It turned out that the sausage sizzle will be there every day. I can see me visiting here more often.

Racking

All the racking we required had been sold, that was a little disappointing to say the least. It didn’t stop us from getting everything else that was required. This included some very long shelves that only just fitted in the car.

Shop

We had to visit another branch of the shop for the rest of the things we needed. That seem to take far too long and took us way past a sensible time for lunch. My stomach started complaining.

Lunch

We sat down at three and tucked into some cheese and biscuits. That changed the hunger growling to content growling coming from my stomach.

Shelves

The heat was leaving the day and it was time to get on with finishing the shelving in the garage. It didn’t take as long as I expected. After a couple of hours all the uprights were in place and firmly affixed to the wall. The brackets had been put on and the shelves placed at various heights. It was obvious that another trip to the store would be required as we needed more brackets and shelves. The shelves that I had put up filled very quickly.

Dinner

We had stuffed peppers for dinner, mainly because we had all the ingredients in the fridge. They were really quite tasty. We ate rather late as our entire day seemed to have shifted.

Cats

We left the bedroom door open last night, In the past this would have been an unnoteworthy event but now we have cats it’s a different matter. The cats started running round the bedroom at early o’clock before settling down on the bed and demanding attention. This didn’t help my addled morning state.

Swim

We went down to the beach for a morning swim. Now that the water is getting a little warmer the group is starting to get a little bigger. The main bulk of the swimmers decided they were going to swim from jetty to jetty. I was feeling a little rough so decided that I didn’t need the walk back. We just swam a little way and then turned around and swam back. I felt vaguely human by the end of the swim but only just.

Club

We met up in the surf club for a drink after the swim. I felt tired, far too tired to make meaningful conversation. I just sat there and stared out to sea. I probably appeared hungover. In this case looks are not deceptive.

Sleep

After running a few errands, we arrived home. I mumbled something about needing to do something in the bedroom. I was asleep in seconds and didn’t wake for hours, I needed sleep.

Shelves

I woke up and decided that I needed to salvage something from the day so I gathered up some tools and started to construct the shelves. It was quite satisfying to build something, even though it was only a set of shelves. After a couple of hours, I had something that looked similar to the picture on the box. It was obvious that there was more work to do.

Early

I was still tired so I went to bed early. I’m fed up with being continually tired.

Ride

I went for the usual Saturday morning ride with the tri club this morning. There was a bit of a wind blowing along the coast which made the ride up to outer harbour reasonably easy. I moved along at my normal pace and found that by the time I got to decision roundabout I’d distanced most of the riders in the group. Two of us decided to go on whilst the rest of them decided to turn back. The wind hit us as we went around the outer harbour roundabout. It made coming back a little bit harder. We took turns on the front but as I was the stronger of the two of us my turns seemed to grow longer and longer. I had to drop to the back once we reached the city as the city is much like the crystal maze to me. I needed a guide to get me through.

Café

We met the others in the café. I had my usual pain au chocolate and hot chocolate and listened to the conversations. I feel that I really should join this club.

Shelves

Loved one wanted some shelves in the garage so we had to visit the DIY store for some materials. We went to the closest store and found that the renovations had finished and the new store had opened. Everything was shiny and new and the staff were very unsure where everything was. We wandered round looking for all the bit and pieces that we needed. We may have been distracted by the sausages in a bun at the entrance.

Dinner

We went to the Masters Dinner last night to see all great and good receive various prizes. It promised to be a good evening

Shark

The opening address was from a man selling shark repelling surfboard wax. This seemed to be terribly inappropriate on several levels. To start with it was about shark attacks, the ocean swimmers in the room were not too keen on listening to someone one talking up the risk of being eaten by a shark. Then he was selling board wax, something that swimmers wouldn’t use. It was also such an obvious sales pitch that it was almost embarrassing. Most people didn’t really want to listen.

Drop

I’ve never been to a dinner where there has been a fifty/fifty drop. There were two menu options but there wasn’t a choice. The food just got presented to you. There then followed a little negotiation so that people who didn’t like one thing could have the other. I can see how it benefits the kitchen but it didn’t enhance the dining experience.

Cross

Many of the women wore backless dresses, it was easy to see that they were swimmers as all of them had a white cross on their backs where their skin hadn’t been tanned under the swimming costume straps.

Morning

I got up early again this morning as I had committed to a ride. Getting up an hour sounds fine in theory but in practice it means pulling myself from the warm cocoon of sleep and into a barely awake world. It was a very nice morning but I could have easily stayed in bed.

Ride

I did the clubs gentle ride this morning. The gentle is short for gentlemen and describes the conversation rather than the speed. We headed down to the coast and turned left. I rarely go this way so it made a nice change. The sea looked very inviting and at point I wished I had brought my swimming clothes. Once we had gone far enough we turned around and headed back to the city and into the wind. It all ended in a hot chocolate at a café.

Interview

I went for an interview this afternoon. This was my first job interview for a very long time so I felt a little nervous. It went reasonably well. I managed to answer most of the questions but I feel that they think I’m too senior for the role. I’ll find out next week.

Party

We went to a children’s party this evening, there was a lot of cake, I was in cake heaven.

Morning

I woke feeling thirsty. The morning cup of tea hardly touched the sides. I’m almost sure I heard the sound of water being poured onto hot sand.

Run

I was dreading my morning run this morning as I felt it would be far too hot. The rain last night helped but it was still hot. I was a ball of sweat by half way though and dripping by the end. At least my heels weren’t too painful.

Call

The agency finally got back to me to say that the company wanted to see me and to suggest an interview time. There was no way that I was going to do it today because I wanted time to prepare or as I know it sleep. He said he would get back to me as soon as he had made the arrangements. I felt that it would be a while going on my recent experience so I made a mental note to keep my mobile phone nearby, something I hardly ever do.

Empire

I’d been procrastinating over gathering together the fruits of my multi media empire into one place for a while now. When I say empire what I mean is my various blogs, photographs and videos that make up the output of my on-line mutterings. It took me about 5 minutes to set up my Facebook page and another hour of fiddling around with the settings. I like to fiddle with the settings just to see what they do. It’s quite possible that I have made the page inaccessible to everyone but me.

Ride

I needed an excuse to leave the house and watering the pots at my mother in laws house was the perfect excuse. I hoped onto the mountain bike and completely ignored the soft back tyre. It didn’t take me long to get there, I had intended to take the longer route but a few spots of rain put pay to that idea. After the watering I picked up the mail and then faced the dilemma of how to get the post and papers to Loved One. I could have hung the plastic bag from the handle bars and suffer the wobbling but instead I opted for the much more inconvenient stuffing the bag up my cycling jersey. I now knew what it would feel like if I put on more weight. It wasn’t nice having my stomach dangling over my legs.

Appointment

The agent rang at the exact moment I thought he would no longer ring. I was relaxing on the sofa and playing with the cats so I had to quickly shift from cat wibbling to my professional voice. I think I got away with it. It was all set the interview was tomorrow. I went back to the cats with a feeling of satisfaction combined with a foreboding of doom.

Cats

The cats are getting less nervous and have started being a little friendlier. Ginger even succumbed to a brushing. Between the two of them they managed to waste the evening away

Early

I struggled out of bed this morning at silly o’clock. The reality of meeting someone for a six o’clock ride hit home. It was a half hour ride to the meeting point. That meant breakfast was just a wistful thought.

Ride

I arrived a little early so that I could do introductions, people drifted to the meeting point over the next 10 minutes, far too many for me to remember all the names. Worryingly they started talking average speeds and the numbers were a bit higher than I was comfortable with. We started off at a brisk pace that I could live with but at a predetermined point the fast group took the head and the pace increased. There was no way I could live with that and slowly slipped to the back of the group. Luckily for me the slower group turned back at the next roundabout whilst the fast group disappeared in a cloud of dust. Five of us headed back at a slightly better pace but I still couldn’t live with it and fell off the back of the group. They waited at the next turn and by the time I’d got there I’d recovered enough to live with their pace.

Turn

I got to the head of the bunch and did my pull but because I miss heard the instruction (or couldn’t tell my left from my right) I turned down the wrong road. This conveniently put me at the back of the group. I was suffering a bit, I knew the coffee stop was close but I was now going down roads I was unfamiliar with. I had to stay with the group regardless of the complaints from my legs.

Decision

As I cycled slowly home I had to make a decision. Should I go out with the usual Wednesday group or should I go back to bed. Going back to bed seemed like a lovely option but in the end, I picked up Gracie the trike and headed back into town. I hoped that they would be as sedate as ever as my legs were not happy

Bike

I met them at the usual place, news of my appearance in the rain had spread through the group so there were a few comments about the weather being dry. We set off along the usual route into the parklands. Our route was thwarted at one point by roadworks but these were easily circumnavigated. The pace remained nicely sedate but the temperatures rose and sapped my energy. I couldn’t believe how much water I was drinking.

Bakery

We ended at the bakery where I bought an apple and custard tart that was the size of my head. I felt that I had earnt it. The hot chocolate slipped down nicely and set me up for the ride home.

Electric

I met someone I know with an electric trike on the way home. Last time we met she said that I could have a go. I got on and started peddling. The electric motor kicked in and made moving along so easy. I felt that this machine could be in my future tricycling.

Sleep

I got home and laid on the bed. I fully intended to immediately have a shower and an hour and a half later I did.

Watering

The heat of the day started to go and the plants had definitely wilted. They needed water and a lot of it. I wandered around the garden doing the watering dance, making sure that all my little green babies had their fill. They looked a lot better once they had had a drink.

Cats

The cats got more active as the temperature reduced. We spent the evening watching ginger attacking the toy mouse that is attached to the scratch pole. It was very entertaining. Tortoiseshell slinked around the edges of the room. She is still not as comfortable with her surroundings as Ginger but I’m sure that in a few days she will be treating Loved One and I as her servants.

Sleep

I felt tired and thirsty this evening. Neither of these was really a surprise. I’d drunk nearly five litres of water today but no more than a dribble had left. I fell asleep feeling thirsty.

Run

I had to get up with Loved One this morning as I wanted to go for a run. It was predicted to be hot during the day and I would rather run in the heat of the morning than the heat of the day. I hadn’t expected much of this run due to the events of the last few days and I wasn’t disappointed. I came back hot and sweaty and in need of a cold shower.

Call

I had a call from the agency this morning to discuss a possible contract, I had to move from tired to professional very quickly. I think I managed it

Hot

It was hot outside. The heat sapped by energy so I looked for indoor things to do. This wasn’t too hard as I have a whole pile of things that need finishing. I settled on finishing a couple of videos that I’d been meaning to get done for a while. The end results are here and here

Interview

I got called back by the agency, it looks like I may be having and interview soon although I’ll not jump up and down until I see a confirmation.

Watering

I spent an hour or so doing the watering dance round the garden. I’m sure that the plants visibly perked up as I watered them. The weather men are predicting this hot spell to go on for another few days so the chances are I’ll be doing the watering dance again tomorrow.

Dinner

We had very little left in the fridge but enough to make harissa chicken with salad. It was very tasty and just enough to satisfy my reduced because of heat appetite.

Ironing

The ironing has been building up and tonight I felt strong enough to tackle the ironing pile. I set up the ironing board in front of the television and started to methodically work through the pile whilst not paying any attention to what I was watching. Loved One played with the cats.

Lie-In

It was absolutely glorious to not be dragged out of the bed by an alarm this morning. I lay on the bed in a semi waking stupor enjoying every moment of not getting up.

Wedding

Loved One’s nephew was getting married today and we had been invited so we had to get dressed up into our posh clothes. I felt a little out of place sitting on the bus into town but it’s a feeling that I’m getting used to. The bus stopped almost directly outside of the building we needed, this was good as it was blazing hot boarding on melting so walking in the shadows was the order of the day.

Registry

We gathered in the waiting room on the 9th floor before being let into the main room for the ceremony. It looked like a small meeting room that had been brightened up with a few pictures rather than a place of celebration. This didn’t matter to the happy couple, by the end of the ceremony they were married

Drinks

We made our way to east end cellars for a drink with all the guests and a few toasts. We had to leave as we had a mission but it looked like the others were settling in for a long day of drinking.

Pick up

We had to bead to the north of town for a very special pick up. We used the powers of maps and a Sat Nav to find the cat ladies house. We had brought a borrowed cat box with us to pick up our two new cats or as everybody else referred to them: our babies. We are now owned by a ginger tom and a tortoiseshell cat.

Timid

We put the box in the lounge and opened the door. Nothing happened. After a while the ginger one slinked out of the box and started to investigate his new home. The other one stayed put for a lot longer. Eventually, she ventured out and hid under the sofa. I feel that they will be hiding under things for the next few days

Reception

The reception was in a house just off the tram which made getting there very easy. Finding the house however was a little tricky as we were expecting much more noise. Instead we found a very quiet street. It took a few phone calls to work out we were in the right place and standing outside the right house.

Curry

We arrived in time for the serving of the curry. Many of the guests had been drinking for quite a while and really needed the food. The curry was excellent, they had obviously perfected the techniques over many attempts.

Cake

Loved One’s nephew is not a cake lover so had asked that there wasn’t a cake. This had been completely ignored. They had made a “cake” from rounds of cheese. It was a thing of beauty. It looked wonderful in the cutting the cake photos.

Home

We needed to go home as we needed to see our babies. We found them sitting on one of the dining room chairs under the dining table. They looked happy and had obviously had something to eat. We went to bed happy.